Van Jones the Communist

Today, I’ve decided to change the topic a bit. Specifically, I want to talk about a significant bit of technological history that just happened.

I assume that you know by now that the president’s “green czar,” Van Jones, has resigned. Jones had come to prominence by merging environmentalism with grievance politics. Pollution, he maintained, is somehow intrinsically racist.

When he was appointed to his czar status, the mainstream media (MSM) did not find it worth reporting that Jones is, by his own description, a communist. The event he says turned him into a full-fledged communist was the beating of Rodney King by white police. He was not similarly moved, apparently, by the recent beating of black conservative Kenneth Gladney by SEIU union members at a town hall meeting.

Regardless, it’s fascinating that a self-avowed communist could be appointed to a top presidential position without notice. If a self- described Nazi were to be appointed by any administration, you can be sure we’d hear about it. Communists, however, make Nazis look like pikers in terms of pure genocidal numbers. According to the book, Le Livre noir du communisme: Crimes, terreur, répression, Communists have killed 94 million people. Originally published in 1997 in France, that book was written by ex-communists. It is now available in English under the title Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression.

Nevertheless, you can call yourself a communist in certain “tolerant” circles and not be seen as supporter of a system that has routinely committed mass murder. So it was not the revelation that Jones is a communist that brought him down. Rather, a single unpaid blogger who goes by the name of Gateway Pundit discovered that Jones had signed a petition that, in essence, accused the Bush administration of either perpetrating or willingly failing to prevent the Sept. 11 terror attacks. It was the final straw.

During the long noisy buildup to Van Jones’ involuntary resignation, not one word about the controversy appeared in the paper pages of The New York Times and many other MSM outlets. Only now are those who depend on these old media outlets even hearing Jones’ name; and it is often in stories that infer that he was somehow smeared.

It is a remarkable state of affairs when important news and objective fact are being discovered and reported by a lone individual using nothing but his computer and an Internet connection. Meanwhile, old media are losing money and firing reporters daily.

This is the power of technology. We will continue to see this sort of disruption across the board, but this specific lesson concerns old media. Few of these old media institutions are capable of adapting.

This is the silver lining to our current economic troubles. Institutions that have forged alliances with political powers to assure their dominance will fail in hard times. FCC regulators will not be able to save the old, petrified media, no matter how hard they try. Similarly, representatives of other industries that have symbiotic relationships with politicians and regulators, from automotive to pharmaceutical, will be replaced in these difficult times.

When we finally emerge from this government-created fiasco, it will be a far better and more profitable world. As old institutions crumble, new ones will be born, and we’ll invest in the best of them.

Patrick Cox has lived deep inside the world of transformative technologies for over 25 years. In the 1980s, he worked in computer software development and manufacturing. By the mid-1990s, he worked as a consultant for Netscape - the company that handled 90% of all Internet browsing traffic at the time. InfoWorld and USA Today have featured Patrick's research many times.

Nice article, thank you. In general I feel that so many American’s have lost their values – that they no longer take pride in a nation founded on freedoms and free markets. A communist is asigned to a position of influence over our economy? How does that happen? Why is it seemingly accepted by the people? But then I see so many views on the internet by common people like me calling foul. We need to be braver and get our voices heard. To keep writing our government officials, to keep politely pointing out the facts to our friends, to… Read more »

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